My Company is Not Big Enough For an Innovation App.

“A big business starts small.” -Richard Branson

Does size matter when it comes to innovation management?

Company size, that is…

Well, there are certain innovation challenges that all sized companies face, no matter size, such as:

• Lack of innovation processes
• An absence of employee engagement
• Sources of innovation
• Needed resources

We oftentimes hear people say “We are only 28 people so it doesn’t really make sense for us to use an innovation app”.

Well, this is where you are wrong. Below we’ll offer four reasons as to why and how innovation apps are valuable and needed in smaller teams.

Lack of Innovation Processes in Your Company

Communication in small companies is easy and accessing knowledge is not an issue. You talk to your team members daily. So why exactly do you need innovation processes in your company?

The problem is that ideas simply get lost without a proper process. Let’s say each employee in your small company (28 people) comes up with a single idea a month(and that’s being conservative). That’s over 300 ideas a year you get from your small team! And the worst thing is that they come through the different channel. Emails, Slack, paper notes… Keeping track of them is impossible without a system.

You’re simply missing the processes to organize the whole thing. A proper method of handling ideas after sharing them. Brainstorming meetings end up being ineffective if there is no follow-up.

It’s difficult enough to manage our own ideas sometimes. Ever happened to you that you forgot that great idea you had just yesterday? Now imagine remembering and managing a couple of dozen ideas at once. Luckily, technology and automation are here to rescue you!\n\nInnovation apps offer the solution to that problem. Allowing you to collect, develop and track all the ideas of your team from their creation until the implementation.

Innovation Apps and Idea Inflow

Your employees want to be heard, but are you listening?

Did you know that 90 percent of managers think that engagement strategy has an impact on the business success?

Shockingly, only 25 percent of business managers have an engagement strategy. See the issue?

Getting employees engaged is easier in the small companies. But it’s still a difficult task to keep them motivated, especially if you don’t have a process to keep them in the loop.

Retaining their engagement is very rewarding. When everybody is involved, the types of ideas and outputs flourish.

People from sales elaborating on product development. Customer support advising the marketing department. The Idea coming from a single department isn’t the same as an idea that was sprinkled with input from all around the company. Combination of ideas creates impressive results as well as boosting employee motivation.

Take Advantage Of Open Innovation

The success rate of open innovation activities is 3 times higher than in-house research. Many small business managers think that open innovation is a privilege of the big companies. That’s not true. Small companies can equally benefit from involving external partners.

Collaborating with your customers can greatly benefit you. Imagine asking a question and getting real-time access to your customers’ ideas.

Let’s look at the practical example.

You want to know how you can offer even better service. You hear from your customers that generally, delivery takes too long. Your employees come up with different scenarios of improving it. Sit back and evaluate the ideas to pick from the best. It’s that easy.

But open innovation isn’t only about involving your customers. Talk to your partners and improve your value chain together. You can even involve your competitors.

Why on earth would you do that? Imagine this, you might be a small fish in your niche market, why not cooperate with equally small firm and try to take over the sharks?

Remember, it’s only up to you how you set it up. You can exclude and include participants however you want.

Save the Much-Needed Resources

As we established previously, there is a certain amount of ideas coming your way each month. In general, the more ideas the better but somebody needs to manage them.

It might be manageable for you from the beginning. But as your email and notebook keep piling up with unanswered suggestions from your employees, you will realize you need help with it. Hiring a new person to take care of it costs money that can be used elsewhere.

Another solution would be finding an external consultant or building your own systems all of which are expensive time-consuming projects. Innovation software and apps, let you benefit from the ability to manage as well as pay less.

So, are you ready to stop talking about innovation and start taking action? Or are you maybe just a tad curious to check out an innovation app for yourself? Head over here to try out Ideanote for free